Counterfeit, Part 2

There are counterfeit leaders, counterfeit preachers, counterfeit teachers. There are counterfeit churches. They have a steeple. They've got a cross, but they are the seat of Satan.

Imagine the reality of that being revealed one day. There are counterfeit spiritual gifts. There are seducing spirits. There are doctrines of demons. Listen, for everything that God has, Satan has a counterfeit. Do you know people who are following a false religion or involved in a church that doesn't teach the truth? In most cases, people don't understand the spiritual reality behind their choices. When you think about the people you know who are following a false religion, they probably think they're following the truth. The reason for that is that Satan is a master at counterfeiting God.

This is Wisdom for the Heart with Stephen Davey. Stephen's in a series called Antichrist and the Many Faces of Evil. Today, he's concluding a lesson he began yesterday called Counterfeit. Open your Bible to Revelation as we rejoin Stephen right now. In my research, I uncovered a popular belief in the 50s. And I was born in 58, and so I was too young to catch this. Some of you who are older than I am probably, or you may remember that there was quite a movement that believed that John F. Kennedy was the Antichrist. I uncovered the runaway imaginations that led to many misguided speeches and even some sermons and articles.

That's unfortunate. Kennedy was, of course, the first president elected who was not a Protestant, but Roman Catholic. And this made our vastly Protestant, fairly biblically literate country at the time somewhat suspicious of a man who was loyal to Rome.

Add to that, at the Democratic Convention, he was elected in 1956 by 666 votes. And that did it. I mean, imaginations just took off. Books were sold on that one.

That really got the imagination going. He was elected president, later assassinated by a shot to the head, a fatal wound, which is how the Bible described the death of the Antichrist. And I read as I researched this issue, there were some, many in fact, who believe that as President Kennedy lay in state, in the rotunda of the Capitol, he would come out of his casket, rise again and assert himself as the ruler of the world, which, of course, never happened.

Now, based on what we do know from John's revelation and from Daniel's vision, from Revelation Chapter 13, which confirms the resurrection, I believe, of the coming Antichrist, imagine that scene. The world would be grieving somewhere around the midpoint of the tribulation over the loss of its greatest peace negotiator. A brilliant genius of a man who has led some European country to a place of national prominence, international prominence. His policies are being copied.

His advice is being pursued on every hand. Only recently he would have solidified a European coalition, taking the reins of three countries whose leaders died, perhaps mysteriously or disappeared. But he masterfully strengthened that coalition, that revived empire by taking over. And the other kings have willingly and gladly granted him the highest rank in the coalition. His skill at leadership and diplomacy would be breathtaking, mesmerizing, reassuring. In a world that is going mad with the outpouring of what we have learned to be the wrath of God, the tsunamis, the earthquakes, the diseases, the epidemics.

His presence will seem to calm everyone as if he is, in fact, capable of riding above it. But an assassin has gotten through, a madman with a sword who struck this great leader. Perhaps it was someone acting in revenge. We're not told who or why. We're only told that the Antichrist will be killed in cold blood. Now the world is mourning as he lies in state in some European embassy or castle.

Your guess is as good as mine. No doubt television cameras from networks around the world are trained on the coffin and other cameras are trained on the tear-streaked cheeks of mourners who've lined up for miles to come and pay their last respects. Just imagine the literal fulfillment of this text suddenly. His eyes open and he takes a breath and he sits up and maybe clambers over and out of the coffin and walks calmly to one of the cameras and announces to a stunned world that he is indeed their Messiah. He has defeated death. He has defeated the grave.

He is the one who was dead but now forevermore is alive. No wonder John would write in Revelation 13, the latter part of verse 3, and the whole earth was amazed and followed after the beast. Look at verse 4. We're told that they worshiped the dragon because he gave his authority to the beast or the Antichrist and they worshiped him.

Who wouldn't? Apart from the discerning grace of God in the lives of those who've come to faith in Christ after the rapture, now living in the tribulation, dying by the tens of thousands for their faith in him and it will only get worse, they perhaps are tested by this sight that they also see. Perhaps it's a challenge to their own faith and apart from the discerning grace and their perseverance as we'll study in our next session, they would give it up and then follow him.

Maybe they're struck by the doubting reflected in John the baptizer. You remember him? He's incarcerated in a cell. He will soon be beheaded. He's going to die and he sends his disciples to Jesus Christ with a question. Ask him, are you the one or is there someone else we should be waiting for?

Should we be looking for someone else? These will be tested when their side certainly doesn't seem to be winning, when the world is celebrating the victory of this king over death itself. And so they worship him. Would you notice how John kind of pulls back the curtain through inspired text and he tells us who they're really worshipping? Look at verse four again.

They worshipped who? The dragon. We've already learned the dragon is Satan.

Here's the raw truth. By worshipping the Antichrist, unbelievers will actually in reality be worshipping Satan. The power behind the Antichrist. Some people will fully understand it. Most will more than likely be simply deceived. Just as those unbelievers in Paul's day were deceived, as Paul wrote to the Corinthians in 1 Corinthians chapter 10 verse 20. And he said, the things which the Gentiles sacrifice, they sacrifice to demons and not to God. In other words, thinking they are worshipping the God to whom they are sacrificing, they are in reality worshipping the demonic world which is impersonating their false god. Whether they comprehend it or not, they are giving their allegiance to the power behind their false religion. They and, listen, the world to come in this generation when Revelation chapter 13 is fulfilled, in reality the world will be dancing with the devil. You imagine, many will go willingly as they blaspheme God and curse him.

Like one European leader who said some time ago, and I quote, if the devil could offer a panacea for the problems of the world, I would gladly follow the devil. The world will one day have its chance to do it openly in the form of worshipping the false Messiah. And let me tell you friends, this is the recognition that Satan has coveted since he fell. This is what he has longed for. A diversion of worship from billions who instead of worshipping the true God are worshipping him.

This is his highest achievement. And how he will thrill to hear mankind chant their worship of the counterfeit Messiah. How he's going to be thrilled to know he has influenced billions of worshippers away from God unto himself. And notice what the world says in verse 4. Who is like the beast? The Antichrist. And who is able to wage war with him?

These are rhetorical questions by the way. Expecting the answer to come back, nobody's like the Antichrist. There's nobody like this Messiah. Nobody can wage war with him.

How do you fight somebody you can't kill? He's the greatest. So they will worship this one who was dead but now came back to life. I mean, how do you compare anybody to him? Oh, that other Messiah. That other Messiah. Yeah, he supposedly rose from the grave but he did it in secret and he evidenced himself only to a handful of people. What, did he have something to hide? Our Messiah has revealed himself to the world.

You can imagine how deceptive this would be. And the world will be delirious with delight over the one who seems not to have the answer to everything. And perhaps mankind's great question, how can I get eternal life? Maybe it'll be through him because he seems to have eternal life. Friends, do you know what's been happening throughout world history?

I agree with one author who put it in these terms. What's been happening throughout world history are simply dress rehearsals for this coming event, this coming leader. The human heart hungers for a visible God. It is ever ready to deify a leader who promises certainly spiritual realities.

I believe that Satan throughout history has always had a man ready. He doesn't know, by the way, the moment of the rapture. He doesn't know when the ensuing tribulation will occur, when he can move forward with his agenda. He has been crafting and honing and perfecting. He doesn't know any more than we know about the future.

He's not omniscient. And so I would agree with those who have said it seems in every generation he has had someone ready, unready to go at any moment. He was ready with Caligula. He studied the emperors and discovered that. He was ready with Nero. In fact, in my research, I could preach a sermon on the false messiah, even in this man. I can't because of time, but there was quite a movement that he was going to come back to life.

In fact, one appeared who looked just like him, claiming to be Nero, come back to life. And he led thousands of people in his deception to their death. Satan was ready. He was ready with Napoleon. He was ready with Robespierre in the French Revolution. He was ready with Mao with his little red book that influenced a quarter of the Earth's population in his hatred of God. He was ready with Hitler. He was ready with Stalin, puppet kings who sold their souls to war against Jesus Christ, who would have gladly stepped forward to rule the world. But they were not God's timing. They were not God's choice. And Satan would literally chew them up and spit them out as only one more failed attempt. His frustration, ladies and gentlemen, has been growing now for centuries.

He's ready at any time. Joseph Stalin's daughter would later talk about her father used by Satan to fight Christ and Christianity, literally martyr millions of Christians. On his deathbed, she described he did something peculiar. She said that just before he died, he'd been unconscious, in and out, unable to move much at all.

But suddenly he sat up in his bed. He looked up at the ceiling and he raised his clenched fists and shook them toward the ceiling, fell back on his pillow and died. His last act was an act of defiance against the savior he hated. But he was worthless in Satan's agenda for he failed.

He was not the one. In his bunker at the end of World War II, just days before he would take his own life, I have read how Adolf Hitler whittled away his time with his close friends, his mistress, his key staff. The untold story until years later was that Hitler had been a man given over to the occultic underworld. He was an avid student of yoga. That word in the Hindu means yoke.

Its intention is to yoke to the underworld, the spirit world. He was an avid student of hypnotism, astrology, eastern occultism. Many believe him to have been, as I do, possessed by demonic forces to do things that can only be explained by the darkness of Satan's kingdom agenda against the Jew and the Christian, certainly a Christ and the world at large. One of his staff members there with him in his final hideaway was a man named Rauschning who described this recurring scenario in Hitler's final days when Hitler now, of course, is no longer a comrade of Satan but a throwaway, puppet king, no longer of use. I quote Rauschning, We would hear Hitler yell for help. We would go in and see him seized with power that made him tremble so violently his bed shook. His lips would turn blue and he would drip with sweat as he would be whispering in terror, it is he, it is he, he is here. Whether he sensed Satan or Christ whom he hated, we don't know, but Satan was certainly through with him.

He could be discarded. Listen to the truth about the final false messiah. Just as everyone bearing the spirit of antichrist, they are only puppets. They are used as Satan's attempts to wrestle worship away from God, and this one will be his masterpiece, his magnum opus. But for those of us who believe in Christ, the antichrist is not someone to fear.

He's someone to pity. In fact, he will be revealed after we are gone. But like Judas Iscariot who did Satan's bidding and then took his life, so did Nero after him and Hitler after him. They danced with the devil and then died. And the horror of it is they will live in the company of those unbelievers and the underworld forever.

Let me close our study today with a challenge and an invitation. For those of you who believe in Jesus Christ, let me give you a challenge again to be discerning. Even today, without the antichrist to do his bidding, the Christian is in danger of being deceived, distracted by the enemy. Listen, for everything that God has, Satan has a counterfeit. There are counterfeit leaders, counterfeit preachers, counterfeit teachers. There are counterfeit churches. Revelation 3 describes them as the synagogues of Satan.

They're basically teaching error. They have a steeple. They've got a cross, but they are the seat of Satan.

Imagine the reality of that being revealed one day. There are counterfeit spiritual gifts. There are seducing spirits. There are doctrines of demons. Paul wrote to Timothy in 1 Timothy 1, verse 4. There are false messiahs. There are false prophets who will arise and perform great signs, especially culminating in this final day we've been studying, where Jesus Christ said they'll perform great signs and wonders to lead astray, even if they can the elect, which they cannot. Matthew 7 and Matthew 24. My question to those of you who believe, when trouble comes, will it detract from your worship?

Will it distract you from your walk? Will it divert you from your commitment to the true and living God? Even now, this is our challenge in a world with false messiahs and anti-Christ agendas. So listen, my Christian friend, to the challenge of the Apostle Peter.

Listen to these great words he wrote. The end of all things is near. I love that phrase. If Peter thought the end was near, what we can know for certain is that it is 2,000 years nearer. So it is really near now. We believe the end of all things is near. So what does that mean? Peter writes, the end of all things is near, therefore panic.

Oh, no, that's not what he wrote. Therefore, be of sound judgment and sober spirit for the purpose of prayer. Above all, that is, knowing the days are at the end, keep fervent in your love for one another, because love covers a multitude of sins.

Be hospitable to one another without complaint, as each one has received a special gift. Employ it in serving one another as good stewards of the manifold grace of God. Whoever is the gifted speaker, do so as one who is speaking the utterances of God. Whoever is gifted in serving, do so as one who is serving by the strength which God supplies, so that in all things God may be glorified through Jesus Christ to whom belongs the glory and dominion forever and ever. Amen, 1 Peter 4, 7 to 11. So for the believer, let this discussion on last days call us to a pure way of living, call us to a gracious love, call us to hospitality, call us to using our spiritual gifts in the body and for the sake of the gospel, so that the body of Christ is blessed and the gospel is advanced. But along the way, no, as Peter said, in fact he started out this way, let the truth about the last days call us to sound judgment. Be discerning. For you, perhaps, you are an unbeliever. Let me give you an invitation to deliverance. The Christian with a study like this is called to discernment. If you're an unbeliever, it is an invitation to be delivered.

Listen, my friend, a counterfeit works well only because it looks so much like the real thing. That's how it works. It models the truth as much as it can. It uses religious terminology. It will even speak of Jesus. It will genuflect in a way to the Bible, to a steeple on a cross. It knows how to hush with a reverential tone at something profound.

It loves to use the word spiritual. Even though it is spiritually dead, it wants nothing to do with Jesus Christ. Listen, the antichrists of the world and the coming final antichrist, you study the antichrists of past eras that were ready and poised, you study this one as we have, and millions of people die for them. Jesus Christ, the true Messiah, died for you.

So I invite you, after a study like this, to eternal deliverance. Don't follow the wrong Messiah. Even now place your faith and your trust in Jesus Christ.

Everybody else is a counterfeit. Only Christ, Peter wrote, is the one to whom belongs the glory and dominion forever and ever. Amen. With that, we bring to a close this lesson entitled Counterfeit from the series called Antichrist and the Many Faces of Evil. Thanks for joining us today here on Wisdom for the Heart. This is the Bible teaching ministry of Stephen Davey. If you joined us late, or if you had to step away for a portion of today's broadcast, you can go back and listen to it in its entirety on our website at wisdomonline.org.

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